Saturday, 7 December 2013

East Cheshire chalked up a comfortable victory on Wednesday night in the quarter finals of the Charnley Cup. My plan to give us Black on odds went to pot when we won the toss and I was told that that meant we had to have White on odds. That meant John, Dave B and I all had to have colours we weren't expecting but we managed to cope.Here is how it went:1. Phil 1-0 R Clucas (158)This was an unusual Karpov-style win for me, play a very quiet opening and gradually accumulating positional advantages to win the endgame. My opponent had a bad Bishop so I just swapped off all the active pieces until it was good Knight against bad Bishop and then it was goodnight! (Bad pun alert.)2. John 0-1 K Lockett (155)Karl played a weird English system where a White pawn appeared on b5 very early on but John played sensibly and rapidly acquired the initiative. However Karl fought like a caged tiger and ultimately John's lack of time proved to be his downfall when Karl launching a winning attack.3. Tudor 1-0 M Whalley (149)Tudor won his opponent's Queen quite early on and then resolutely ground him down. A thorough demolition.4. Dave N 1-0 D Hughes (124)Dave was able to play his much-loved Accelerated Dragon opening and quickly equalised. However his opponent played sensibly and it wasn't until the King and Pawn endgame that Dave managed to outplay him.5. Dave B 1-0 S Douglas (99)Dave bravely stuck his Queen on the Kingside where it was rather exposed but looked threatening. However his opponent didn't manage to take advantage of Dave's bravado and eventually Dave's killer Bishop on b2 won the day.6. Nick 1-0 DefaultThanks for showing up Nick!See you on Wednesday for the Christmas social.